Italy’s complex election law left both parties short of the 40 per cent share needed to form a government, opening the prospect of a prolonged period of political deadlock.

Matteo Salvini leads The League, formerly known as the Northern LeagueCredit:
AFP

The vote was widely seen as an angry reaction to Italy’s endemic unemployment and failure to control migration – both of which, polls show, are blamed on the failings of the European Union.

It was also a stunning repudiation of Italy’s governing establishment, with the centre-left Democratic Party of Matteo Renzi and Silvio Berlusconi’s centre-right Forza Italia losing massive vote share to the anti-establishment parties.

Mr Renzi was forced to resign as party leader – 15 months after resigning as prime minister when he lost a referendum on constitutional reform.

Matteo Renzi gives a press conference the day after Italy's general elections Credit:
ALBERTO PIZZOLI/AFP/Getty Images

The country faces deep uncertainty as the rival parties try to convince Sergio Mattarella, the president, that they each have a mandate to form the new administration.

“We’re like Christopher Columbus, sailing into the open sea without any idea where we’re going,” said Giovanni Orsina, a political analyst from Luiss University in Rome. “Anything could happen.”

Mr Di Maio, the 31-year-old university drop-out and former football stadium steward who leads Five Star, said the party "feels the responsibility to form a government.”

Smiling broadly and addressing the country in a televised news conference, he said: “This election was a triumph for the Five Star Movement. We are the winners. More than half of voters in some regions have voted for us.”

He said Five Star’s strong performance meant that it “represents the whole nation, from Val D'Aosta (a northern region bordering France) to Sicily. The others can't say that."

Five Star Movement leader Luigi Di Maio talks during a news conference, the day after Italy's parliamentary election, in RomeCredit:
Reuters

Five Star has historically said it would never enter into a coalition, although Mr Di Maio said he would be "open to discussion with all political actors".

"Everyone is going to have to come and speak to us,” said Alessandro Di Battista, a senior Five Star leader.

But Mr Salvini, who heads the Right-wing League, was equally insistent that he should be the country’s next prime minister.

The former journalist, who has pledged to deport hundreds of thousands of migrants back to their home countries, said he had "the right and the duty" to form a government after his party quadrupled its share of the vote compared with how it performed at the last election in 2013.

"Italians have chosen to take back control of the country from the insecurity and precariousness put in place by Renzi," he said.

Despite “bunga bunga” sex scandals and endless legal entanglements, the 81-year-old had returned triumphantly to the political fray and was tipped as a probable kingmaker in a moderate coalition.

But the dismal performance of his party, which took just 14% of the vote, put paid to that.

“One never knows, but it seems to me that it will be hard for him to come back from this. For the Right, Berlusconi is the past, Salvini is the future,” said Prof Orsina. “I’m not sure Forza Italia will exist in one or two years’ time. This could be the beginning of the end for Berlusconi.”

Beppe Grillo, the standup comedian who founded the Five Star Movement, joked of him: “We turned him into biodegradable waste.”

Stand-up comedian Beppe Grillo founded the Five Star Movement nine years ago as a protest against political corruption and cronyismCredit:
AP

“The centre-Left and the Left suffered a crashing defeat,” said Wolfgango Piccoli of Teneo Intelligence, a risk consultancy firm.

“The vote has radically transformed Italy’s political landscape and its repercussions will be long-lasting.”

The vote split Italy in two, with the League dominating the north and Five Star sweeping to victory in the south.

In the case of prolonged deadlock, President Sergio Mattarella could choose to leave in place the current centre-Left government of prime minister Paolo Gentiloni.

This would allow time to set up a temporary government to reform the electoral law and organise new elections.

"The likeliest outcome remains a president's government of national unity to govern for six months to a year while the politicians gear up for a new election," said Luigi Scazzieri, the Italian specialist at the Centre for European Reform think-tank.

Lorenzo Codogno, a former chief economist at the Italian treasury, said: “Be prepared for long and complex negotiations that will take months.”